Accused wife killer Dawson back in court

More than 100 gigabytes of potential evidence has been gathered by investigative podcast The Teacher's Pet into the alleged murder of Sydney mother Lynette Dawson, a court has heard.

Former rugby league player and teacher Chris Dawson was in Sydney on Thursday for a brief court hearing after being charged in December with murdering his first wife who went missing from the city's northern beaches in 1982.

The 70-year-old, who is living in Queensland under strict bail conditions, was accompanied by his brother, Peter Dawson, at Downing Centre Local Court on Thursday.

Magistrate Megan Greenwood granted the crown extra time to sieve through "more than a hundred gigabytes" of material collected by the Australian newspaper journalist Hedley Thomas for the podcast.

She also altered some of Dawson's bail conditions. He can now travel 25 kilometres from his Sunshine Coast home rather than just 20km.

Dawson's lawyer, Greg Walsh, told reporters outside the court that Thomas had potentially compromised the case by interviewing witnesses for The Teacher's Pet.

"Not only the accused's case but the prosecution case (too) because what he's done is to impact upon the reliability of witnesses," Mr Walsh said.